Getting Live Freight Rates During Order or Invoice Entry

  1.  Administrator
  2.  Connected Business

It’s much easier to decide, whether you want to make the purchase or not, if you know how much the freight charge is for a specific order with items included in it. The Freight Quote option is a tool that allows you to get live freight rates based from the information provided by selected shipping carrier supported within Connected Business. Note that these freight rates are just estimates from your shipping carrier; other shipping charges may apply and the final freight rate may differ depending on the carrier account and the way the package is tendered to the carrier.


Aside from going to the Shipping module to inquire the shipping rate, a powerful new option is now embedded within the order and invoice forms in the Customer module. The Freight Quote option, when clicked, will give you the freight charge which depends upon the weight of the items, the carrier and service type set up in the Shipping module. Another benefit is that it also supports getting freight quote for multiple boxes to ship.

As a requirement, you will need to correctly set up these options:

    • Carrier Accounts – The carrier used such as USPS, FedEx or UPS must have the details and information correctly set up. You may set it up by navigating to Shipping module > Setup > Carrier Plugin and then select the carrier e.g. UPS. For more information on the details of the carrier plugin, you may refer to: Carrier Setup.

    • Shipping Method Info – To use the realtime freight charge, you need to set this up through the Carrier Details of the selected Shipping method. Indicate the details in the required fields such as carrier, service type, packaging type, billing type and the supported address type in the Shipping method Option (see screenshot below).

      The Weight Threshold option – is a tool used to pre-define the weight limit of the package provided in the shipping transactions. When an item exceeds the defined weight threshold, the system automatically creates a second package for the said order.

      Click Image to View Video

    • Weight of the Item – The item(s) that is to be included in the order should have a given weight in the Setup tab of the Itemform.

Inquire Realtime Freight Charge Within the Order or Invoice Form

    1. Create a Sales Order. Go to the Customer module > Order > New Order then select a bill to or ship to customer.

    2. On the Order form, add an item(s) on the inventory line.

      Make sure that the shipping method and the location used on the Sales Order form is the correct shipping details as configured from the Shipping module to get the estimated rate.


      Click Image to Enlarge

    3. Click on the Freight Quote button from the menu options. The Freight Quote pop up will then display with the estimated freight charge returned by the selected carrier.

    4. You may now proceed with creating the shipment transaction.

To create the shipment transaction, you may godirectly to the Shipment Details tab within the Sales Order or Sales Invoice form and the shipment form will be displayed. As you click on the Get Labelbutton or pressing [F12], notice that the freight charge value is the same as the rate indicated within the Sales Order form when using the Freight Quote button. See screenshot below:

Click Image to Enlarge

Alternately, you can also go to the Shipping module > From SO or From INV to open the Sales order or Sales Invoice form. I hope you find this information worthwhile on your shipment transactions.

For more information, refer to the Realtime Freight on Order/Invoiceonline documentation.

Thanks for taking the time to read this blog!

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